2017

As we have at times in the past, our organizations and the people we represent joined together again in early September, seeing and feeling the commonality of our oppression and the oneness of our oppressors and issued the following joint statement:

The recent wave of attacks on our civil rights, including the discriminatory rhetoric repeatedly used by our highest elected officials, undermines black and brown people, immigrant communities, indigenous populations and low income people alike...Part of both of our efforts have been to consistently fight against the caging of our bodies for profit. People of color are overwhelmingly criminalized more for less in this country. The prevailing reason for this devastation and ever-expanding criminalization of our communities is that in doing so, the mass incarceration industry and the individuals that benefit from its growth enjoy extravagant profits. Every opportunity to take advantage of marginalized people are capitalized upon for profit. Policies that continue to do so are directly aligned with the white nationalist agenda that has become more prevalent at local, state and federal levels.

Earlier this week, US Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced that the US government will discontinue the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. While there are some legislative options to repair this in the next six months, it was an unnecessary move to begin with and one that quite plainly, is morally reprehensible. This act will send the lives of 800,000 individuals, many who live, raise families, go to school, and work in this country into a tailspin, shattering the families and communities to which they belong. People who trusted the US government with sensitive personal information and the lives they have lived in the only country many of them have ever known, are now being told that they will have to leave and make their lives elsewhere; the US government is telling these folks that they are not valued in this country. We must also be clear that the impacts of DACA will be felt among Latinx communities as well as in other immigrant communities. Terminating DACA will make them more vulnerable to a legal system that shows a proven bias towards people of color, a system that is designed to make money from our criminalization… Legislation that keeps dignity first, demonstrates an understanding of the root causes and intricacies of migration as a global phenomenon, and ending the criminalization of communities of color, should be our first priority.

MORE and IFCLA will continue to align our strategies and efforts over the coming months, in order to more profoundly call out and work against this oppression in all forms.